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Press release

Leading Liberal Democrats call for low carbon economy and environmental

investments to escape sluggish growth

A new book - The Green Book: New Directions for Liberals in Government - launched in Westminster today proposes radical and innovative new directions for the Liberal Democrats.

The book, edited by Duncan Brack, Paul Burrall, Neil Stockley and Mike Tuffrey, with a foreword by the Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg brings together leading Liberal Democrats and sympathetic experts who call on the party to put centre stage the need to preserve the natural world on which our society and economy depends for their health, well-being and prosperity.

The Green Book argues that a low carbon economy and environmental investments are the best way to escape from sluggish growth, to create new jobs and to share prosperity fairly. The Green Book calls upon Liberal Democrats to treat the environmental crisis as a core challenge of economic policy, rather than as a discrete problem.

Neil Stockley, Chair: Lib Dem policy working group on the Transition to a Zero Carbon Britain said “For too long, we’ve put ‘the economy’ and ‘the environment’ in separate silos. The ‘green growth’ policies described in this book offer the best opportunity for the UK to escape from recession and to build future growth, jobs and prosperity.”

"We want the Green Book's proposals for a sustainable prosperity to provide the core of the Liberal Democrats' appeal at the next general election', said Duncan Brack, Vice Chair of the Liberal Democrat Federal Policy Committee and its manifesto drafting group. “This is already a clear distinguishing feature between Liberal Democrat and Conservative ministers, where Tories have done their utmost to obstruct Liberal Democrat efforts to support green industries, despite their potential for growth.”

Mike Tuffrey, convener of the Liberal Sustainability Network said "The Green Book is a wake-up call for Liberal Democrats, who have become complacent on the environment. The leading businesses I work with are demanding more from politicians and this book offers a public policy blueprint for a sustainable future markedly more radical than any party."

Paul Burrall said: “We need to focus more on policies that benefit people next year and in the medium and long-term rather than just think about any impact on next week’s opinion polls.”

In the foreword Nick Clegg calls the Green Book ‘a welcome and provocative challenge to our thinking, and a valuable source of ideas for the future’.